Weather Journal: Prepare for Chilly Temperatures

With successively colder cold fronts moving through Greater New York over the last couple of weeks, only an inanimate object wouldn’t be able to tell that fall is on the way.

What’s coming will be even colder.

On Thursday, expect increasingly chilly weather as north winds pick up and an extremely dense, dry, unseasonably cold air mass moves in all the way from Alaska’s north slope.

The coldest weather of the season so far will bring sub-freezing temperatures right up to New York City’s doorstep this weekend — some 20 degrees cooler than average for this time of the year. Saturday morning lows in Westchester will dip down to 33 degrees, with frost advisories likely to be posted during the day on Thursday or Friday. That’s about 20 to 30 days earlier than the typical first frost of the year for the city’s northern suburbs. Temperatures will be even colder upstate, with the first hard freeze of the winter likely for much of the Hudson Valley as temperatures drop well into the 20s. The cold air outbreak should bring an early end to what has otherwise been a tortuously atypical growing season for farmers upstate.

In the meantime, brisk sunny days will close out the work week across the tri-state with little in the way of rain chances expected before next Monday. Highs will remain below normal until a warm front and associated moisture moves in late Sunday.

Thursday’s Greater New York forecast roundup:

WSJ Headquarters in Manhattan:

Actual High: 59; High feels like: 57

Actual Low: 49; Low feels like: 46

Weather: Sunny again

Brooklyn: 61/47

Queens: 62/50

Bronx: 61/47

Staten Island: 59/47

Poughkeepsie, N.Y.: 59/41

Trenton, N.J.: 62/43

Islip, Long Island: 61/45

New Haven, Conn.: 60/42

Meteorologist Eric Holthaus contributes daily weather reports and analysis on Metropolis. For the latest on conditions in New York and elsewhere, follow his updates (@WSJweather) on Twitter.